[TowerTalk] Rain static

[Michael Tope]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tom Rauch" <w8ji at contesting.com>
To: "K8RI on Tower talk" <k8ri-tower at charter.net>; "Joseph Sheinman" 
<w2bhk at earthlink.net>; <towertalk at contesting.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 31, 2005 5:12 PM
Subject: Re: [TowerTalk] Rain static


>
> > I think you will find that precipitation static  is neither.
>
> To the contary Rodger. I find virtually everyone describes
> corna as "precipitation static".
>
>> It's basically the a charge building from many droplets, or snow flakes
>> removing electrons from the ungrounded elements, or wires. The charge
>> builds to the point where it arcs over.
>
> That would be a pop then. It would occur with the flashover.
>
>> I've never had precipitation static from a grounded antenna.
>
> I don't call that "pop" precipitation static. Like most
> people I've talked to, I call that very rapidly pulsing,
> musical hissing, or musical whining noise that builds in
> level until eventually I hear a "pop" (at the moment of a
> lightning flash in the distance) "precipitation static".

The "precipitation static" I observed around here (Los Angeles
area) last winter on 160 meters (and also 40 meters) sounded
almost like line noise from a generator running at varying speed
(it had a surprising man-made quality to it). Sometimes it would start
out at a slow rate and then speed up (as if somebody was pressing
on the accelerator), level off, and then die down again. Sometimes
it was bad on all the antennas I had, and at other times, it would
be bad on the 40 meter beam and 160 dipole, but not present on
the K9AY loops. It seemed to correlate roughly with stormy
weather, but it wasn't clear that it correlated strongly with the
actual rain rate although admittedly I didn't pay careful attention
(I was waiting for breaks in the noise so I could try making
contacts in the ARRL DX contest). On the occasion that I had
problems on 40 meters, the band went from very quiet with Q5
copy on 8Q7VV to S9+10dB precipitation static in just a matter
of a few minutes. When I went outside after the noise started, it
was raining very hard.

73 de Mike, W4EF..............